# What's the worst city in the US? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 24, 2003, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642 "2003-09-24T22:05:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![t-keela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a3d4f5/32.png) [@t-keela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/t-keela)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2003, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/101 "2003-10-17T22:56:51Z")
Actually **vibro** the crime rates in Nashville are one of the highest in the nation. Worse than either Baltimore or Gary. So ya see, y’all Tennesee’ans still got some bragging rights. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![t-keela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a3d4f5/32.png) [@t-keela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/t-keela)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2003, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/102 "2003-10-17T23:17:56Z")
Damn **vibro** what’s up in Tennessee? I just checked out the crime rates in Memphis and they’re almost as bad as Nashville. The only reason they weren’t listed in the worst was because of it’s smaller population. A lot of smaller cities have a higher crime rate than the BIG cities. Supposedly due to skewed data? I don’t know what to say about us poor Texicans…our crime rates have dropped out of site since we let everybody carry guns. Houston’s crime rate is down in the 7’s from a 15 a few years ago. Dallas is a bit high but still in the low 9’s down from 16’s. El Paso at 5, Austin 6, darned shame ain’t it… Many of the one’s that ain’t scared to do crime probably killed each other off… 😉 or are in prison, WE got lots of prisoners. Think I’m going to find some unemployment rates now. Wonder which city will have the highest rate of unemployment? ---
**Author:** ![kniz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@kniz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kniz)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/103 "2003-10-18T05:15:52Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by maskedman \* > **Along the way, we saw the ‘celebrated’ waterfront of Baltimore and wondered just how many drugs you had to do to ever think that the waterfront was a nice place.** You must have just thought you saw the “celebrated waterfront” or perhaps you were on drugs. I have been there twice and would gladly return. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![kniz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@kniz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kniz)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/104 "2003-10-18T05:22:33Z")
Oh, and that thing about Huntsville, AL is ludicrous along with the statement about the state of Alabama generally. Smells pretty much like sour grapes, IMHO. ---
**Author:** ![Brutus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Brutus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brutus)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/105 "2003-10-18T05:30:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Mr. Obvious \* > \*\*…5) Detroit, MI–I lived in metro-Detroit for 7 years…the place sucks. The government is crooked…the police force doesn’t give a shit…there is NOTHING to do in the entire city…on Saturday’s and Sunday’s (when the Red Wings and Tigers aren’t playing) the place is a ghost town. Seriously…you can drive around downtown Detroit and see 50 people max. When there are over 10 websites devoted to documenting the decay and vacant buildings of your city…you know you have problems. > … \*\* I don’t want to sound like I am defending Detroit, but there are quite a few places to go and things to do there. (Talking about Detroit proper, not the 'burbs). Clubs, bars, restaurants, and casinos a’plenty. ---
**Author:** ![Hyperelastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Hyperelastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hyperelastic)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/106 "2003-10-18T21:36:37Z")
I think we should limit “city” to the central city in a populated area, or the populated area itself, because most big cities have hellhole suburbs like Compton where all the problems seem to get dumped. Places like that have what you might call an unfair disadvantage in a competition like this. If you consider the intangibles, you’ll never reach a consensus because different people have different likes and priorities. If you limit the criteria to statistics, you might get some agreement. I had a “worst-city” argument with some people a couple of years ago, and being a native of the Rust Belt, I was pulling for Gary, Indiana and Youngstown, Ohio. But looking at stats like violent crime rate, unemployment, and education level, **Fresno, California** came out of left field and blew every place else away. To address some other posts: East Cleveland, Ohio is a city in its own right - an old, inner-ring suburb. Kind of a craphole. Someone said that Arbutus was the worst-named city, but glance at any map of southern West Virginia and you can find worse names without even trying. Leet, Crum, Sod and Mud leap to mind. ---
**Author:** ![eman77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f04885/32.png) [@eman77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eman77)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2003, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/107 "2003-10-19T00:35:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by elmwood \* > \*\*You must be from Toronto, right? > > I think I posted the following in response to a GQ a long time ago, posted by another Torontonian, wondering why Buffalo has so many house fires. > > The Straight Dope: > > 1. The Buffalo area has a very dominant subculture of volunteer firemen and fire geeks. Outside of the City of Buffalo and a few suburbs, all area firefighting agencies are manned by volunteers. Many suburban residents, especially those in the blue-collar eastern suburbs, are very loyal, almost fanatic members of their VFD. There’s also plenty of wannabes and fire-chasers who spend quite a bit of free time monitoring their scanners, and chasing apparatus around the Iroquois-named first ring suburbs. > > If there are no full-blown house fires in Buffalo that day, television news departments will try to find a local kitchen fire, or a blaze in the Southern Tier or Northwest Pennsylvania. Fires always lead the news in Buffalo because that’s what the viewers, a large portion being fire geeks and VFD members, want. > > 1. Until World War II, North Tonawanda, a suburb of Buffalo, was the largest lumber transshipment port in the United States. Buffalo also experienced a huge influx of German immigrants through the 1800s, many of which were carpenters. The result? Most houses are wood frame. Combine the abundant supply of late-1800s era frame houses with elderly, overloaded electrical systems (1920s-style death wiring!), and you have a perfect recipe for lead stories on Channel 7 Eyewitness News. > > Toronto didn’t have the abundant inexpensive lumber of Buffalo, nor the German immigrant carpenters. That, and closer ties to a UK architectural heritage, resulted in a vintage housing stock that’s mostly brick. \*\* I turn on the TV every morning and there is at least 4 housefires and they all seem to be in Tonawanda, Cheektowaga or in the Southern tier around Alleghany county. There rarely seems to be one around Amherst, plus all the fires around the west side or east side seem to be started by arsonists (oh and there are plenty of those fires). ---
**Author:** ![WilliamsCrane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/958977/32.png) [@WilliamsCrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WilliamsCrane)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2003, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/108 "2003-10-19T13:36:33Z")
…seems to be that there shouldn’t be any hometown “rooters” for a city to be able to make the list. Having lived all over the US, I know (for example) many people who loyally swear by their hometowns of Buffalo, Baltimore, Oakland, Youngstown and Cleveland. We may disagree, of course, but I doubt a place could really be all that bad if educated, worldly urbane professionals show that sort of loyalty for places that some of us refer to as “shitholes”. Places that never seem to have any hometown “rooters” as far as I can tell Detroit and Flint, MI Any of Chicago’s Indiana border cities (Gary, East Chicago…although I did come across a rooter from Hammond, IN once) Midland and/or Odessa, TX Erie, PA Nogales, AZ ---
**Author:** ![TheLoadedDog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/35a633/32.png) [@TheLoadedDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheLoadedDog)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2003, 7:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/109 "2003-10-20T07:52:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Alan Owes Bess \* > \*\ ***ccwaterback,** > > I think I get your drift. This whole thread is a “US” city thing which is why I held off, on the grounds that I would be completely off topic. It would seem a breach of protocol, as it were. > > From my perspective, Lithgow, NSW, is the absolute pits. > > It’s a down at heel, former mining town (still is in a very minor way), and the museum, which covers the glory days of 1840-90 is moderately interesting, but breathtakingly boring. > > There is absolutely nothing to do there. > > I have ambled through the shopping centre and I can assure you that everyone there has a bored look in their eye. > > The vehicles going through the main concourse all look bored. So do the drivers. > > The police officers loafing around chewing on their unhealthy snacks in the shoping centre look bored. > > I tell you, Lithgow is the absolute pits. > > Even at 11.00 pm walking past the “wildest” Lithgow taverns or clubs on a Friday or Saturday night, you’re not likely to meet with anything more exciting than a falling down drunk departing from some pub or other, without even a helping hand by the hired help. \*\* Heh. Yes, Lithgow is so bad, it’s not a city, and it’s not in the US, and it STILL deserves to win 1st prize. Actually no. Portland, just up the road, is a margin more horrible. I used to live there (maybe that’s why). Anyway, my Step-brother is the Lithgow ranger. Oh the stories he could tell. \<20,000 population, and 900 people on the methadone programme. He estimates there are another thousand who aren’t on the programme but should be. Lithgow is bad, bad news. A great shame though, because it is in beautiful country. ---
**Author:** ![cuauhtemoc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecb155/32.png) [@cuauhtemoc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cuauhtemoc)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2003, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/110 "2003-10-20T14:45:13Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by kniz \* > \*\*You must have just thought you saw the “celebrated waterfront” or perhaps you were on drugs. I have been there twice and would gladly return. 😉 \*\* There ya’ go. I knew I wasn’t the only one. ---
**Author:** ![cuauhtemoc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecb155/32.png) [@cuauhtemoc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cuauhtemoc)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2003, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642/111 "2003-10-20T14:50:33Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by kniz \* > \*\*You must have just thought you saw the “celebrated waterfront” or perhaps you were on drugs. I have been there twice and would gladly return. 😉 \*\* There ya’ go. I knew I wasn’t the only one. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-city-in-the-us/203642.md?page=5)